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Retailers hoping to engage shoppers may want to try handing out bubble gum at the door, according to new research.

In a series of five studies, researchers from Ryerson University's Ted Rogers School of Management in Toronto found that handing out gum to shoppers encouraged them to shop for more items and with a higher level of engagement.

The act of chewing made the shoppers more alert.

“If you’re more alert, you’re more likely to absorb the information that is in the store — the promotional and even the nutritional labels — and have the cognitive function to absorb that information,” said Seung Hwan (Mark) Lee, associate professor, retail management, at Ryerson University's Ted Rogers School of Management.

The results were published in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services.

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Although one of the five studies found that people chewing gum as they shopped for groceries were more likely to buy more items, none of the studies made a strong connection between chewing gum and money spent.

“I can’t say from my research that it has led to buying more products or more expensive products, but one can sort of deduce that if people are browsing more and spending more time shopping, it could result in higher sales,” said Lee.

The studies were conducted in Denver and Toronto, and included testing in a lab where volunteers were asked to imagine they were shopping online, a study that involved volunteers being asked to shop at Amazon.com, and a field study involving 56 grocery store shoppers at an unnamed retailer in Toronto.

Hubba Bubba Bubble Gum was used in the research because it was chewier than other brands, according to the study. The act of chewing was also important – shoppers did not respond the same when given candies that can’t be chewed.

The study determined that two pieces of gum is the optimal number of pieces to hand out to shoppers. Giving them too many pieces of gum causes them to focus on the gum, not shopping.

“People feel awkward if you give them more than two,” said Lee, who conducted the research with student Ksenia Sergueeva, a graduate student in the Master of Science in Management program.

People shopping with friends or family or small children are less likely to be positively affected by chewing gum, according to Lee. That’s because their brain is already busy with the people they’re with and the gum is an added distraction.

Previous studies have found that chewing gum reduces stress, makes people more alert, productive, and better able to concentrate, because it enhances the delivery of oxygen and glucose to the brain.

A form of magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and positron emission tomography (PET) scans have confirmed that chewing gum increases blood flow to the brain.

The research was funded by the Ted Rogers School of Management and the College of Business, Colorado State University, according to a spokesperson from the management school.

“It’s difficult to draw a direct parallel between how people react to something and whether they buy it or not,” said Diana Lucaci, founder and chief executive officer of True Impact, a firm that uses neuroscience to help retailers better understand and market to consumers, and Canadian chair, Neuromarketing Science and Business Association.

Lucaci pointed to variables like packaging and product distribution as other contributing factors.

She said she would also expect that the impact of chewing gum would vary between shoppers, comparing it to the different environments different people require when they study.

“Some people study or work well in a noisy environment, some people need a quiet cubical-like space to work. It differs from person to person.”

According to the research paper, there is evidence that Northern Europeans chewed birch bark tar as long as 9,000 years ago, to relieve pain. Mayans chewed a tree gum called chicle, which was also used as a plaster on cuts.

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